WE ARE ALL THATCHERITE NOW:

Francois Fillon is an unbounded admirer of the Iron Lady, whom he credits with getting the United Kingdom back on track when it was on the brink of economic disaster in the 1980s.

"Some candidates wanted to be unkind by calling me Thatcherite, but it pleased me," he said recently, brushing off attacks from his rivals who wanted to cast him in a negative light, adding: "At least she left her mark as someone who straightened out her country."

For Fillon, who was himself Prime Minister for five years under former president Nicolas Sarkozy, the Conservative British Prime Minister is a symbol of an "inflexible political determination to stop a situation of decline."

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